FLEET FOXES

Sun Giant

(Sub Pop)

People often say that a band is a breath of fresh air, but rarely does a band actually sound like one. Fleet Foxes are the clean, crisp inhale you can only find outside of the city, high up in a mountain field, or along a tranquil river. On their debut EP for Sub Pop, Sun Giant, the band have so skillfully re-created a sense of the great outdoors that all it takes is a pair of headphones and closed eyes to be transported to their pastoral landscape.

Sun Giant begins with reverb-soaked, layered vocals, like a hymnal rejoicing in the summer and spring, a communal yet solitary song you could imagine Jeremiah Johnson singing to himself in his log cabin. "English House" is a peaceful stroll through an open field, tall grass and wildflowers under a bright blue sky. "Mykonos" is the sunset that follows, darker but still undeniably beautiful, a track that could easily have fit on Fleetwood Mac's Rumours. Throughout the album, Fleet Foxes' classic folk rock is balanced by inspirations even older—almost Renaissance fare—that give their songs a unique twist. The result is more timeless than nostalgic.

The EP ends back where it began, with singer Robin Pecknold's magnificent, reverberated croon taking center stage, this time accompanied by light guitar strums. At only five songs, the one problem with the record is that it's over too soon. As an introduction to the band, Sun Giant succeeds completely, leaving the listener wanting more, like a blissful vacation coming to an unwanted close. Once Fleet Foxes have transported you to their idyllic world, it's dreary to open your eyes and realize you're still stuck in the bustle of the city... at least until their proper full-length comes out later this year. JEFF KIRBY

EARTH, ROOTS AND WATER

Innocent Youths

(Light in the Attic)

1/2

Earth, Roots and Water were the house band for Toronto's Summer Records, the reggae label already spotlighted by last year's Summer Records Anthology 1974–1988. This addition to Light in the Attic's series of Toronto reggae reissues is different: Rather than an anthology, Innocent Youths is a straight reissue of Earth, Roots and Water's only album, a seven-cut disc initially released in 1977. There's a backstory attached, of course (you don't get an obscurity reissued without one these days): Expat Jamaicans in Toronto set up studios and labels, record music of variable quality and distribution (Innocent Youths was originally only available in an edition of 500; the band found much of their local audience in Toronto's punk community), then dissipate like their dubbed-up tracks into ether, only to be resurrected by latter-day crate-diggers. The question is whether that story resonates more deeply than the actual music, and, by a hair, that's how it is with Innocent Youths.

Which isn't to say the album is devoid of moments worth hearing. ERW's grooves are sturdy, especially noticeable when there aren't any lyrics around. Oddly, the vocal tracks tend to diffuse the listener's ear more than the instrumentals—peace-and-love song "Lou Sent Me," which blends roots skank and supper-club voice, is the oddest example of this; the horn-driven "Zion" is the best. What's most notable is the three Augustus Pablo–like dub cuts: The opening title track bobs by on its melodica lead, while "Jah Les' Lament" recalls Pablo's electronic keyboard excursions circa East of the Nile River. MICHAELANGELO MATOS

BEACH HOUSE

Devotion

(Carpark)

Beach House are the Baltimore duo of singer/organist Victoria Legrand and guitarist/keyboardist Alex Scally. Together, they create spare, gorgeous pop songs that are as picturesque as they are desolate, like long-vacant versions of the band's namesake. They belong, roughly, to the same East Coast soft-rock school as Grizzly Bear, in that both bands filter faded pop forms through fresh meshes to produce sounds at once surprising and nostalgic.

At the center of Beach House's delicate sound is Legrand's dreamy voice, which sounds like it comes straight to your earbuds from some vintage, hanging microphone. Beach House surround Legrand with gentle electric guitar, vibrato organ hum, and glassy keys, backed by unobtrusive electric-organ preset rhythms made of lisping, shuffling high hats, woodblock clicks, muffled kicks, and diffused snares.

Their sophomore album, Devotion, opens with the Western-sauntering slow dance of "Wedding Bell" and the fainting spell "You Came to Me" before getting to lead single "Gila," the most immediately arresting song here. Its reverberating guitar-twang melody is eerily familiar but impossible to place—I'll figure out what it reminds me of five years from now—and its nearly wordless chorus is benevolently haunting. "Some Things Last a Long Time" is a lovingly faithful cover that—prepare for critical embarrassment—I initially misidentified as a Built to Spill original (apologies to Mr. Johnston).

Elsewhere, Beach House are pleasantly inviting ("Invite your sister/Into the garden," "Come over to my house/I'll pour some tea for us") and impressionistically vague. Some songs sound like dusky dreamscapes, others like soft sunlight breezing through sheer window shades. Whatever Beach House's mood, the songs of Devotion stick with you long after the music is gone. ERIC GRANDY

Straight to Hell

Sid & Nancy

Tapeheads

200 Cigarettes